A Poem For Sunday

Cheap Seats, The Cincinnati Gardens, Professional Basketball, 1959 by William Matthews

The less we paid, the more we climbed. Tendrilsof smoke lazed just as high and hung there, blue,particulate, the opposite of dew.We saw the whole court from up there. Few girlshad come, few wives, numerous boys in moltlike me. Our heroes leapt and surged and loopedand two nights out of three, like us, they'd lose.But "like us" is wrong: we had no resultthree nights out of three: so we had heroes.And "we" is wrong, for I knew none by nameamong that hazy company unlessI brought her with me. This was lonelinesswith noise, unlike the kind I had at homewith no clock running down, and mirrors.

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